


Ficlets and Manips

by hylen



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Meet Cute AU, Non magic AU, additional tags may be added as well, pure fluff, rating may change idk for sure yet though, there will be minimal to no angst
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-25
Updated: 2016-12-08
Packaged: 2018-06-04 09:38:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6652693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hylen/pseuds/hylen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Regina Mills is a straight-laced perfectionist living in the world of interior design by day. At night, she is a Photoshop guru on Tumblr where she can let her love of all things Clexa fly free. When a clever little blonde steps in and begins writing ficlets to go with her posts, it spurs on a friendship neither would have ever thought possible.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [WifeysforLifey](https://archiveofourown.org/users/WifeysforLifey/gifts).



> So this all came about when Aimee (wifeysforlifey) and I were discussing what Regina and Emma's Tumblr aesthetics would be. I absolutely had to write it out. There are so many headcanons and I plan on trying to include as many of them as possible throughout this fic. Major thanks go to her for talking through all of my ideas and helping me figure out a few timeline things.
> 
> Also it should be noted that the events of The 100 ep 3x07 and all episodes after that will not be occurring in this fic as they were incredibly stupid.
> 
> Also also the beards do not appear. Anywhere.
> 
> If you have any questions, feel free to contact me on Tumblr where I'm noideawhatimcapableof. Hope you enjoy!

Regina glances at the clock on her dashboard as she speeds down the highway, cursing her client for being so long winded. She would have been home an hour and a half ago if they had just shut up for once. Grumbling to herself, she exits and drives toward her apartment as fast as the speed limit allows. Her stomach growls softly, but she chooses to ignore it for now. It’s already very possible that she’ll be late, so she decides to just skip dinner and eat later.

Pulling into her parking space, Regina rushes up the stairs to her third floor apartment, almost dropping her keys in her haste to get inside. She tosses her keys and purse on the side table and kicks off her shoes, running into the living room. She lights the three candles in the middle of her coffee table; something she started doing several years ago. It helps her relax and unwind after a long day at work.

Turning off the lights, Regina settles on the couch and powers on the TV. She navigates to the correct channel and breathes a sigh of relief as her favorite show starts at nine on the dot. She’s been watching The 100 since the pilot aired and had instantly fallen in love with Clarke Griffin. While she’d made it through all of season one and the beginning of season two without shipping Clarke with anybody, as soon as Lexa appeared in season two, Regina started getting feelings. Those feelings grew even more once Clarke and Lexa actually had scenes together, and before she realized what was happening, she was a hardcore Clexa shipper.

Regina watches with rapt attention, barely able to contain her excitement that the show is finally back from hiatus. At the first commercial break, she runs to her room to change out of her work clothes and into a much more comfortable pair of sweats and a t-shirt. She determines that she has just enough time to head into the kitchen and grab a couple of string cheese sticks before jumping back on the couch at the end of the break.

The cheese is gone in about five seconds, but Regina doesn't move for the rest of the episode. She gasps when the Ice Nation warrior holds a knife to Jasper’s throat. Although she's honestly not too upset because he's been kind of an annoying shit. She cheers when Clarke has sex with the woman from the trading post. Except she can't help but imagine how rank Clarke is and really that's just kind of…gross. At the very end of the episode, her jaw drops and she is stunned into silence when one of the warriors from the trading post earlier, captures Clarke and holds a sword to her throat.

She’s disappointed that Lexa wasn't in the episode at all, and her little Clexa shipper heart breaks a little bit. The last time they saw each other ended in probably the worst way possible for them, and Regina just needs them to get back together. Because Lexa has to apologize and Clarke has to forgive her and then they can live happily ever after.

With a soft sigh, Regina gets up and heads into the kitchen. Her stomach is really growling now – the string cheese clearly wasn't enough to tide her over – so she looks for something to eat. There’s leftover Chinese from the night before, so she decides to just eat that. She's too tired to actually make anything for herself.

Sitting back down on the couch, Regina grabs her laptop and opens up Photoshop. The end of the episode had given her an idea for a manip, and she just can't wait to get started on it. Searching for pictures is a little difficult. The episode literally just ended and it's the first of the season, so there’s not much to go off of. But she manages to find exactly what she needs and starts to work.

It takes a couple of hours to finish which is longer than usual, but she's also not usually trying to eat at the same time. The stubborn part of her refuses to just wait until she's finished eating. Leaning back, she looks over the manip with a critical eye, checking for any mistakes. It's an image of Clarke and Lexa, standing over the warrior that captured Clarke at the trading post. His throat is slit and there’s blood on the sword in Lexa’s hand. But neither of them are looking at him. They're staring at each other, Lexa’s free hand resting on Clarke’s cheek, and it looks like Clarke is leaning in for a kiss. The manip looks pretty damn good if she may say so herself.

Regina posts the manip with the usual tags, and then begins scrolling through her dashboard to get caught up on everyone’s post-episode reactions. She keeps an eye on her activity feed, eager to see what people think of the artwork. She always loves to go through and read people's comments and tags. It's interesting to see the other fans’ reactions and interpretations. When the reblogs start coming in, they are full of comments as usual.

_“This is so freaking gorgeous!”_

_“Regal’s at it again with the beautiful manips! Can't wait to see what else she gives us this season.”_

_“Hoooow do you art?!”_

Regina giggles at that last one before one reblog in particular catches her eye. It's from one of the better known fanfiction authors in the fandom, and it looks like she's added a little ficlet. She reads through it and her heart melts. The ficlet fits perfectly with what she's created and tells the exact story she was trying to convey.

She goes directly to swanheda’s askbox, determined to thank her for the addition, but as soon as she's there her mind blanks. She's followed swanheda – whose first name is Emma according to her sidebar description – for a while, and Regina knows what an amazing writer she is. She's created some of the most beautiful fanfiction and amazing meta that Regina had ever read.

And so Regina’s not really sure how to proceed. She doesn't have the right words to express how much she loves Emma’s work overall and especially the ficlet attached to her manip. She's an artist not a writer. And she's never spoken to Emma, so she's not comfortable just freaking out in her askbox. She honestly doesn't even know if Emma actually follows her back or not. It would be slightly easier if they were mutuals, but she's pretty sure they're not.

Sighing softly, she closes the tab and goes back to her dashboard, reblogging the post with the added ficlet and adding tags about how much she adores it and how perfect it is. Maybe Emma will see them and know how appreciative she is?

Sometimes Regina wishes she could be more outgoing when it comes to talking to people. Especially those whose work she admires so much. It should be so much easier online because of the anonymity. But it's not. So instead she reblogs a few more things and then decides to call it a night. She does have another early morning the next day after all. Thank god it’ll be Friday though. She has some more ideas for fan art she can make over the weekend.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so glad y'all enjoyed the first chapter! Thank you to everyone who left comments and kudos, as well as added the fic to your subscriptions. It makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside that people like it. 
> 
> I'm pleased with my update time for this chapter, but I'm not sure when the next update will be. I've got a bit of a busy weekend, so we'll just have to see what happens. If you have questions or anything feel free to comment or contact me on Tumblr at noideawhatimcapableof. Enjoy chapter two!

_Lexa remained hidden behind the tree as she saw Clarke and the man who had taken her make camp. She’d been trailing them for a full day and had finally managed to get caught up. Now she just had to wait for the perfect moment to strike. She waited – silent and perfectly still – until the warrior finally fell asleep. Stealthily moving over to him, she drew the sword across his throat and whispered, “Yu gonplei ste odon.”_

_She then moved toward Clarke, placing a gentle hand on her shoulder. Clarke’s body jerked slightly as she woke with a start. Her eyes were fearful for a split second before she realized it was Lexa hovering over her. Lexa made quick work of the rope binding her hands and pulled down the gag around her mouth, before pulling Clarke to her feet._

_Glancing around, Clarke instantly found the slain warrior and looked back up at Lexa in shock. Lexa smirked and shrugged. “I heard you were in trouble. I had to help you. And I have to apologize for Mount Weather. I am sorry, Clarke kom Skaikru.”_

_Swallowing thickly around the sudden lump in her throat, Clarke licked her lips before leaning forward and kissing Lexa softly. A gentle promise that they would be okay._

-swanheda’s ficlet added to regalskaikru’s manip

As soon as the episode is over, Emma goes into the Clexa tag and waits for the Photoshop and gif wizards to work their magic. She’d done her usual liveblog of the episode and now she’s waiting for inspiration to strike so she can maybe write a one-shot. Her favorite thing though is to attach little ficlets to the manips she really likes.

She keeps an eye on both the tag and her dash, and when a gifset of Abby helping Raven off the horse, she swoons all over again. Emma may be all about Clexa now, but Doctor Mechanic was the whole reason she even started watching the show, so they will always hold a special place in her heart. She reblogs it and then goes to refresh the Clexa tag.

As soon as she does, a gorgeous manip catches her eye. She doesn’t even have to look at who posted it to know that it is regalskaikru’s work. Clarke and Lexa are standing over the warrior – now dead – who had captured Clarke, and they look like they’re about to kiss. She instantly gets inspiration to write, so she pulls up the reblog and writes a little bit to go along with the picture.

She’s super proud of it and hopes that maybe it’ll get Regal to notice her. When Emma’s friend had gotten her into the show, she gave Emma a list of blogs to follow. At the top of the list had been regalskaikru; often referred to as Regal by the rest of the fandom even though everyone knows her name is Regina.

Emma has never spoken to her, but she wants to so bad. She has zero skills in the Photoshop department and has admired Regina’s abilities from the get go. She’s too nervous to actually strike up conversation though. Regina has her circle of friends and she just seems like she’s got her shit together – both in fandom and in real life – whereas Emma most definitely does not.

Opening up Regina’s blog, Emma scrolls through it. Interspersed with the Clexa and other fandom posts, are pictures of various flowers and bubble baths. From the looks of it, the posts are Regina’s own and Emma giggles softly at the number of candles surrounding the bathtub. She counts and decides there are at least five too many. Why does someone need that many candles for a bath? Isn’t that a fire hazard or something?

Shaking her head, she chuckles softly and sets the laptop aside before going into the kitchen. If she ever actually talks to Regina, she is absolutely going to make fun of her for the candles. Because honestly, it’s just excessive.

She pours some Fruit Loops and eats them while standing over the sink. Even though she’d eaten before the episode started, she’s still starving. While she eats, a fic idea pops into her head and she starts mentally writing it, trying to finish her cereal as quickly as possible. Generally, once an idea comes to her, she has to get it written down quickly otherwise it’s lost forever.

Setting the empty bowl in the sink – she’ll clean it up before bed…maybe – Emma heads back into the living room and settles in on the couch. She finds a movie to watch on Netflix, bringing her laptop into her lap and typing up a few ideas. Checking her activity feed shows that Regina has reblogged the manip with Emma’s added ficlet. Directly from Emma herself. She’s not freaking out over that. Nope. Not at all.

Okay she’s totally freaking out.

Emma reads the tags gushing about how her ficlet is perfect and says exactly what Regina was trying to show with the manip. Her grin is bright and happy and she’s feels almost like she’s floating. She has admired Regina for so long and now the other woman is returning the favor. Emma feels the need to message her and thank her for her kind words, but she’s incredibly nervous about it.

Going back to Regina’s blog, Emma opens the askbox and…sits there. Why is this so freaking difficult? She would gladly hide behind the anonymous option – something she may or may not have done in the past – but it would be fairly obvious pretty quickly that it was her. She’s almost positive that nobody else added any kind of ficlet to Regina’s manip. After a minute of gathering the courage – and honestly it’s ridiculous that she feels the need to do so; it’s not like they’re meeting face to face or anything – Emma starts typing. She doesn’t pay attention to what she’s written until she’s finished and goes back to read it.

_Thank you so much for your kind words about what I wrote. I have admired you for so long, and your fanart inspired me almost as soon as I saw it. I cannot wait to see the other amazing things you have in store for us in the future. You are so talented._

She hits send before she can give herself the chance to back out completely. Her heart is pounding in her chest and she rolls her eyes at how utterly stupid she is being. Regina is just another person in love with the same show and the same ship. She’s not above Emma in any way.

Except she’s super popular in the fandom and amazingly talented and apparently stunningly gorgeous, if the selfies that Emma is now scrolling through are anything to go by. Well shit. That does nothing to calm Emma’s nerves.

She rolls her eyes at herself again because she’s acting insane. She sent a message. That’s it. She didn’t ask Regina out. They don’t even know each other. Besides it’s highly unlikely that Regina will even respond. She probably gets tons of messages all the time. Or if she does, it’ll be a generic ‘Thank you very much!’ and that’ll be the end of it. Closing out of Tumblr, Emma opens up a Word document and decides to just ignore everything except the fic she plans to write.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so glad I'm able to get this up in the middle of my crazy busy weekend. I wrote a large chunk of this chapter at work in between customers, so I apologize if it feels disjointed at all. I read through it and it doesn't feel that way to me, but I did also write it so.
> 
> I am so happy that y'all are enjoying reading this fic as much as I'm enjoying writing it. I hope you like this chapter and if you have any questions or just want to chat you can find me on Tumblr at noideawhatimcapableof.

Regina stifles a yawn as she walks into her office, holding onto her large coffee for dear life. She stayed up way too late after the premiere last night and is feeling sluggish this morning. For probably the thousandth time, she finds herself wishing that The 100 aired on Fridays, so she could stay up as late as she wanted without consequence.

Sitting at her desk, she takes a large sip of her coffee and wiggles her mouse around to wake up her computer. Her best friend and business partner, Ruby, pokes her head into the office and smiles brightly when she sees that Regina is there. She moves further into the room and sits down in one of the visitor’s chairs across from Regina.

“You look awful. Late night?” Her grin widens even more and she wiggles her eyebrows suggestively.

Regina rolls her eyes and shakes her head, ignoring Ruby and looking through her emails. “I _was_ up later than I should have been, but not for any reasons you’d find interesting. My show came back on last night, so I was doing stuff for that after it was over.”

“You are such a nerd,” Ruby says softly, tilting her head to the side before reaching out to cover Regina’s hand. “Honey, I love you. But you need to get a life. Preferably of the sexual variety.”

“Ruby!” Regina yanks her hand away, standing up and walking to the door to check that no one had heard. She closes the door and turns back around with her hands on her hips. “I _have_ a life. One that does, in fact, include sex. Just because I don’t brag about it and flaunt it, doesn’t mean it’s nonexistent. Unlike you, I don’t want the office knowing every time I’ve had to make the walk of shame home.”

“Excuse you, I call it a walk of _no shame_. Because there is nothing shameful about having sex.” Ruby was turned around in her chair and smiling at Regina. She holds a hand up to cut Regina off when the other woman rolls her eyes and opens her mouth to argue. “Seriously. But I get that you don’t like talking about that stuff. So I’m sorry. But tell me honestly, when was the last time you went out on an actual date?”

“Excuse _you_. I went on a date just last week,” Regina points out with a scoff.

Ruby rolls her eyes and smirks. “Yeah, and twenty minutes in you called me from the bathroom and told me to call you in ten minutes and make up an emergency.”

“Well…she was an imbecile.”

Ruby raises an eyebrow and grins. “You think everyone is an imbecile.”

Regina lets out a huff and mumbles, “I don’t think _you’re_ an imbecile.” She sits back down at her desk and returns to her emails, purposely not looking at the wide smile spread across Ruby’s face.

For her part, Ruby holds one hand over her heart while the other wipes at nonexistent tears. “I always knew you loved me. I just didn’t realize how much.”

Regina sighs in exasperation and chucks a paperclip at her. “Don’t you have work to do?”

“Actually yes. I have a client meeting in five minutes. I’m going to be out of the office for the rest of the day though, so I had to fit my daily ‘bug Regina’ time in at some point.”

“Well you’ve succeeded, so you may go now.” Regina lifts her hand and gestures toward the door. The harshness of her tone is diminished by the kind smile she offers her best friend. No matter how much Ruby annoys her, she will always put up with it because she cares for the other woman dearly.

 

* * *

 

True to her word, Ruby is out of the office all day, and Regina revels in the blissful silence. She loves the other woman so much, but she has a habit of not knowing when to shut up. It’s the end of the day when Ruby finally comes back and sticks her head in the office. “Hey, I’m starving. Do you want to grab dinner?”

Regina takes a moment to think about it. Normally she would, but she’s so tired. She kind of just wants to go home, take a bath, and settle in early. She gives Ruby an apologetic smile and shakes her head. “Not tonight. I think I’m going to go home and just relax.”

Ruby smirks and shoots her a knowing look. “You’re going to go home and get on Tumblr all night. I know you.”

Regina adopts a haughty expression and shrugs. “I hadn’t decided yet.”

That makes Ruby snort. “Yeah okay. Whatever you say.” She walks over and gives Regina a hug. “I love you, nerd. See you on Sunday?”

“Yeah,” Regina replies with a nod, gripping Ruby’s arm lightly in an attempt to return the hug. “Mother wants us there by six-thirty. She has some new recipe that she’s excited about.”

“Which is code for she found a recipe on Pinterest that she’s making your father try.”

“Exactly.” Regina smiles before pushing Ruby toward the door. “Go on. Have fun tonight doing whatever you end up doing.”

 

* * *

 

Regina walks in the door and kicks off her heels with a sigh of relief. She’s looking forward to a weekend without them. It had taken another twenty minutes to get Ruby to leave the office and that was only after Regina finally agreed to walk out with her. Honestly, if it wasn’t for Ruby, Regina would spend way more time at work than is actually necessary.

She decides to go with something easy for dinner and orders a pizza. While she waits for it to arrive, Regina changes into more comfortable clothes and settles down on the couch with her laptop. She’ll probably take a bath, but that won’t be until after she eats.

Pulling up Tumblr, she’s surprised to see the notification that she has a message. Sure a lot of people reblog her fan art, but it’s not very often that anybody messages her. She goes into her inbox and her jaw drops slightly when she sees that it’s from swanheda – Emma she has to remind herself.

She reads the message and can’t help the grin that spreads across her face. It will never stop amazing her when people compliment her work. And apparently Emma has been a fan for a while. Oh great now she’s blushing. Rolling her eyes at herself, she types up a response and makes sure to answer it privately. It’s much easier for her to talk to Emma now that the other has made the first move.

Checking the outbox – god bless xkit – Regina rereads Emma’s message and her own reply, smile still firmly in place.

_No thank YOU. Nobody has ever written fic inspired by my art, so it was very exciting to see. You are an incredibly talented writer and I’m so glad I could give even a little inspiration to you. And you’re in luck as far as wanting to see more goes. I have a few ideas that I’m going to work on and post over the weekend._

She loads Photoshop and starts looking through the images of Clarke and Lexa that she already has saved to her computer. It doesn’t take long before she’s working on a new manip, hoping to get it finished quickly. And if she’s checking Tumblr every few minutes to see if she’s gotten a new message? Well that has nothing to do with much of anything does it?


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -rises from the ashes-
> 
> I LIVE!!
> 
> So it's been something like five months since I updated. I don't really have an excuse except that life got majorly in the way and pretty much killed any muse I had at all. But the muse has returned and I am very pleased and excited about getting this story going again. 
> 
> To those that were enjoying the fic, I sincerely apologize for how long it took me to get back up and running with it. Hopefully you'll stick around with me.
> 
> Major thanks to Aimee for really pushing me and helping me get through the slump.
> 
> As always if you'd like to get in touch with me, you can find me on Tumblr at noideawhatimcapableof or on my newly created Twitter account fictionbyjess. Hope you enjoy!

Emma sits on the steps behind the bar to take a quick break, pulling her phone out of her pocket and opening the Tumblr app out of pure habit. Checking the activity feed, she feels a little thrill run through her spine when she sees that Regina has answered her message.

She may or may not have gone through about half of Regina’s blog - including her entire selfie tag - when she’d finished her fic the previous night. She has determined that Regina is unfairly gorgeous, a bit of a nerd, and likes candles way more than any normal person should. And Emma has absolutely developed a small crush on the other woman.

Reading through Regina’s response, Emma’s grin widens and her thumbs are itching to send another message. Okay so it might be more than a small crush. She navigates over to send Regina another ask, pausing to think about what she wants to say.

_ That’s so exciting!! I can’t wait to see what you make. I have a couple of story ideas myself, but won’t be able to actually write anything down until I get home from work. Right now they’re all just jotted down on pieces of receipt paper. Btw, I was looking through your blog and you use WAY too many candles for your baths. I hope you keep a fire extinguisher nearby for emergencies :P _

She almost deletes the little emoticon, but decides to keep it in anyway. They are using Tumblr after all. It’s not like these are formal emails they’re sending to each other. Before she can look through Tumblr any more, Emma is called back inside. The bar is starting to get busy, and she knows she won’t get another break until it’s time to go home.

 

* * *

 

By the time Emma finally makes it home, it’s almost three in the morning. She’s usually home around midnight, but the bar had been slammed and her manager asked her to stay. And well, she’s never going to turn down the opportunity to make more money. She’s just glad she doesn’t have a shift at the bookstore tomorrow. Or would it be considered today? Either way she can sleep as late as she wants.

As exhausted as she is, Emma knows she’s too wired to actually sleep anytime soon, so she fires up her laptop and logs into Tumblr. She’s excited to see the notification that she has a new message, and even more excited to see that it’s a response from Regina.

_ I should have something posted later tonight. Where do you work? If you don’t mind my asking. I look forward to seeing what those ideas create. I do not use too many candles! I use just the right amount thankyouverymuch. If anything, I could use some more. Candles are perfect for creating a calm and relaxing ambiance. _

Emma chuckles at Regina’s message. She was only half joking with the candle thing, but Regina’s insistence that there aren’t too many just makes her want to keep poking fun.

She goes to Regina’s blog, but before sending another message, she finds Regina’s selfie tag and looks through it again. One in particular makes Emma’s face light up with glee. For once, she is so glad that she lives alone because there’s no one there to see the manic look of happiness on her face. She clicks on the link to Regina’s ask and immediately starts typing.

_ It is absolutely too many candles and creates a giant fire hazard. However, the candles are nothing compared to this picture I just found of you. A flower crown? Really? How “regal” of you. :P Also I work full time at a bookshop, but also work a couple of nights at a bar. That’s where I was tonight. _

Emma heads back to the main page of Regina’s blog and looks for any new artwork. Regina had mentioned she’d have something posted later that night and it’s probably been several hours since she sent the reply. She finds the new post and grins. It’s just as gorgeous as the rest of them. She reblogs it without adding a ficlet - she can’t spoil Regina too soon - before heading back to her dashboard. As she likes and reblogs various posts, a notification pops up on Tumblr’s instant messaging system. She clicks on it and grins when she sees it’s from Regina.

_ regalskaikru: You wear a flower crown one freaking time and nobody lets it go. Not to mention the fact that I was at a freaking renaissance festival. AND NOT OF MY OWN VOLITION I WAS DRAGGED THERE BY RUBY AND KATHRYN THOSE BITCHES HAVE RUINED MY LIFE _

Emma laughs loudly before replying immediately.

_ swanheda: Are Ruby and Kathryn your other hipster friends? Do they wear flower crowns and use too many candles too?? Also what time is it where you are because it’s after 3am here and it’s almost too late for even me to be up. _

Emma’s in the middle of reblogging about ten different posts about cereal when she hears the messenger notification. But now she’s made herself hungry, so with a quick “aww fuck you guys I made myself hungry” post she gets up and heads into the kitchen. She hears the notification again while she’s in there and smirks. Moving back into the living room, she sits down with her bowl of Fruit Loops and looks at the new messages.

_ regalskaikru: And here I thought you were actually going to be cool. You’re evil just like them. No they are not my hipster friends because I am not a hipster. I just like a few candles with my baths okay? It’s after 4am for me. I should definitely be asleep, but I had a burst of inspiration and didn’t want to stop. What are you doing up so late? _

_ regalskaikru: Are you getting food? Is it cereal? How can you eat cereal this late at night? Eat anything? I’d get so sick. _

Shaking her head with a laugh, Emma takes a giant bite just to spite Regina even though the other woman can’t see it. She sets the bowl down before responding.

_ swanheda: I totally got cereal haha. And it’s sooooo delicious. _

_ swanheda: Okay but I actually am cool. Would your friends write fic and add it to your artwork? Actually they might because I don’t know your friends at all. But I’m just going to assume they are nowhere near as cool as me. Because I’m the coolest to ever cool. OMG GO TO SLEEP WOMAN! You can finish tomorrow or something jeez. I didn’t get home from the bar until about three. Normally I’m home earlier, but we were crazy busy so I stayed until closing time. _

She takes a selfie of herself with the bowl of cereal and posts, secretly hoping that Regina hasn’t gone to bed yet. She’s really enjoying talking to the other woman, and even though it’s ridiculously late, she doesn’t want to stop.

_ regalskaikru: I can’t believe you’re eating so late. That is so not healthy. No my friends don’t write fic at all. In fact they generally make fun of me for being as involved in fandom as I am. You’re right though. I actually should go to sleep. I have yoga class at ten in the morning. I’ll talk to you tomorrow :) _

_ swanheda: HIPSTER!!! Only hipsters go to yoga class at 10am on a Saturday morning. Will you be having a kale smoothie afterward too? Have fun though. And sleep well. We’ll definitely talk tomorrow. _

Emma tries - and fails - to keep the disappointed pout off her face as she sends her message. But they’ve agreed to talk the next day, so that’s definitely a plus. And her pout morphs into a grin when a small notification pops up at the bottom right of her screen informing her that regalskaikru has just liked her photo post.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whaaaat a chapter update?? I know. Finally right? Life got in the way as it is wont to do. It sucks, but that's the way it is. I hope you enjoy this chapter! 
> 
> Thank you for reading and as always you can find me on Tumblr at noideawhatimcapableof (I don't post as much on there anymore, but I do still check my messages all the time)

Regina exhales slowly as she fluidly moves into the next pose, stretching out the muscles of her lower back. She closes her eyes as she stifles a yawn. A tiny part of her regrets staying up so late because it’s made her morning miserable, but at the same time it was totally worth it. 

She can’t help the small smile that forms on her face when she thinks about her brief conversation with Emma. The other woman is kind of a spaz and Regina has no idea why she was so nervous about talking to her in the first place. She catches movement out of the corner of her eye and turns her head slightly to see Kathryn staring at her. Oh god. She silently prays that the other woman didn’t notice the goofy smile on her face. She’ll never hear the end of it if she did.

When class is over, Regina quickly rolls up her yoga mat and grabs her water bottle before standing. She’s halfway to the door when Kathryn catches up to her with a light punch to her shoulder.

“What the hell? Why didn’t you wait for me?”

Regina can hear the offense in Kathryn’s voice, but she knows it’s just pretend. She glances over her shoulder with a smirk. “It’s not my fault you’re slow.”

Kathryn rolls her eyes, hooking her free arm around Regina’s as they make their way out into the cold Boston morning. “Where are we going for brunch today? I can’t wait for you to tell me all about what - or who - put that little grin on your face.”

With a chuckle and a shake of her head, Regina just says lightly, “I’m sure I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

 

* * *

 

When they’re settled in a quiet corner of the restaurant, each with a mimosa in front of them, Kathryn leans forward with a sly grin. “So who are they?”

“I’m sorry?” Regina feigns ignorance as she sips her drink and pretends to look over the menu. There’s no actually need to. They come here for brunch at least twice a month, and she always gets the same thing.

“Oh don’t even. You were grinning like an idiot all through class. I haven’t seen you like that since college. You’ve totally met someone haven’t you?”

Regina sighs and rolls her eyes. “I haven’t met anyone. Not really. I’ve just started talking to someone on tumblr.” She mumbles the last part, knowing that Kathryn is going to give her so much shit for it.

Kathryn’s eyes immediately light up and her grin widens almost comically. “You met another nerd! So are they male? Female? Neither? Why did you start talking? Was it because of that ridiculous show that you’re obsessed with?”

“You are so mean!” Regina reaches out to lightly smack Kathryn on the arm. She chuckles before leaning back in her chair. “She’s a woman. I posted a picture I had made, and she reblogged it and added a little story to it.”

“It’s a match made in nerd heaven.” Kathryn smirks before smiling up at the waitress as she takes their food orders. After the waitress leaves again, she leans forward and rests her chin in her hand with her elbow on the table. “So tell me all about her.”

Regina can’t help the giant grin that spreads across her face before telling her best friend everything there is to say about Emma.

 

* * *

 

A loud banging on her front door wakes Emma up a little after eleven in the morning. She stumbles out of bed to open it before the banging gets any worse. Blinking away the sleep from her eyes, she focuses on the form of her best friend. Her very pissed off best friend whose arms are now crossed as she glares at Emma.

Shit.

They were supposed to meet for coffee that morning. Opening the door wider, Emma smiles apologetically and launches into a ramble before Mary Margaret can say anything. “I’m so sorry. I’m the worst I know. I didn’t get home until like three this morning and I was up really late and honestly completely forgot about coffee. You are more than welcome to hate me for it.”

Mary Margaret’s anger instantly disappears and she rolls her eyes before moving into the apartment. “Oh shut up, I don’t hate you. I could never hate you. I figured you must have gotten home late.” She heads toward the kitchen to make them some coffee, freezing as she enters the room. “When was the last time you cleaned in here?”

It’s Emma’s turn to roll her eyes as she follows Mary Margaret into the kitchen. “I’ve been a little busy between the two very demanding jobs that I have. And I can’t exactly afford a cleaning lady or anything.”

She watches as Mary Margaret starts cleaning the kitchen, and makes a half-assed attempt to stop her before just sitting at the small table. “You don’t have to do that you know. I  _ was _ planning to get around to it.”

“Yeah well you didn’t, so I am.” Mary Margaret chuckles with a shake of her head. She’s quiet for a moment before looking over at Emma. “So why were you up so late after getting home from work? Did you find someone at the bar and bring them home with you?”

Emma throws her head back and lets out a loud laugh. “Oh my god you wish. That’s actually a hilarious thought. The only way I’d take somebody home from that bar is if I was just as drunk as they usually are.”

“Okay then why? I know you usually stay up for a bit, but you made it sound like you were up for a while.” She turns fully to look at Emma and sees the blonde trying to hide a blush. “You did meet someone! You can’t keep a secret from me Emma Swan! Who is it? Do I know her?”

Emma sighs and bites her lip. The problem is that Mary Margaret  _ does _ know Regina. Or at least knows of her. Mary Margaret is the whole reason she started watching the show in the first place, and when Emma decided to join Tumblr she’d been given a list of all of the Clexa shippers to follow. Regina was top of the list.

“Um...well you kind of do. Her name is Regina and she’s regalskaikru on tumblr.”

Dropping the dish she’s currently rinsing, Mary Margaret turns around with her jaw dropped open. “Are you dating regalskaikru and you didn’t even tell me?! Oh my god does she live in Chicago?!”

“Whoa chill out.” Emma throws her hands out in front of herself to add to her request. “I am  _ not _ dating her. We just started talking the other night and continued last night. And no she doesn’t live in Chicago. I don’t know where she lives.”

“But-but she’s...oh my god I can’t believe it. So are you friends with her? Do you think you could get her to follow me? I’ve been a fan of hers forever.” Mary Margaret gushes as she practically flails in her excitement.

Emma rolls her eyes and groans. This is exactly why she had never mentioned that she’d stated talking to Regina at all. “You need to stop. She’s just another fan of the show just like us. I guess we’re friends? I don’t really know. We literally just started talking to each other like two days ago. But she is a lot of fun to talk to.”

Mary Margaret narrows her eyes at her best friend and grins. “You totally like her already don’t you?”

“No. Not at all. Maybe. I don’t know. Does it matter?” Emma stammers and shakes her head.

“I guess not.” Mary Margaret shrugs. “It’s just really cool because she’s so popular within the fandom and she is a master with Photoshop.” Drying her hands, she walks over to sit across from Emma at the table. “So tell me what she’s like. Is she as cool as she seems?”

“She’s kind of a giant nerd.” Emma laughs before telling Mary Margaret everything she’s learned about Regina so far.

  
  



End file.
